


Hustle

by voidpilsner



Category: Prison Break
Genre: Angst, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Showers, Sickness, post-escape
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-14
Updated: 2019-04-14
Packaged: 2020-01-13 00:25:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18457715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voidpilsner/pseuds/voidpilsner
Summary: "Where do we go from here?""Exactly where we were going before."[ Michael gets sick, Lincoln knows what he needs. ]





	Hustle

"You okay?" Lincoln asked, looking over to his brother. Michael had a sheen of sweat over his whole face and his eyes were glazed and listless.

Michael nodded, his face not changing from his stoic and resolute expression. "Fine."

"You're not fine." Lincoln murmured, catching his brother again. "Listen, let's stop at the next motel and we'll—"

"We can't stop!" Michael snapped, banging his hand against the dashboard of the old truck they'd stolen. "We can't."

"Then let me drive for a bit." Lincoln said in a soft voice, concern washing into his eyes as he noticed the distinct tremble in Michael's hand.

Suddenly Michael pulled onto the shoulder of the narrow road, just barely managed to put the car in park and scrambled towards the ditch. Lincoln immediately followed, unbuckling his seatbelt and muttering a curse under his breath. 

"Michael?"

Michael fell to his knees and immediately started heaving up what little stomach contents he had. Lincoln sighed worriedly as he stood a few feet away.

"You sick or?—" He asked after his brother had finally stopped.

Michael took some heavy breaths in and sat back. "I'm fine." He muttered as he stood, swaying slightly. 

Lincoln didn't hesitate in closing the distance between them and reaching out to support the other man.

"Linc." Michael whispered, closing his eyes.

"Yeah?"

"I'm going to pass out." Michael slurred out, collapsing against his brother's steadying arms.

Lincoln caught the man before he hit the ground, and with a short grunt, lifted him up. He was no light weight, but he eventually got him settled against the truck's bench seat. With one last concerned glance, he shut the door closed and walked over to the driver's side.

Luckily, there was no one around and the roads were clear as far as the eye could see. Lincoln drove them another two hours before Michael even stirred, and when he did, it was only to switch from sitting up to lying down. He laid himself across the length of the bench seat and tucked his head onto Lincoln's lap, a pained sigh escaping his unguarded lips.

Lincoln reached down and felt Michael's forehead, noting the burning fever that he seemed to be in the midst of. He lightly trailed his fingers toward the back of his head, through his soft hair, and was surprised to see Michael lean into his hand. He repeated the action multiple times before he pulled into the nearest gas station to fuel up the car.

"Mike." He murmured, carefully manhandling Michael back into a sitting position. "Just gotta wait here okay? I'll be right back."

Michael gave a slight semblance of a nod as his sweaty head fell against the passenger window and a wheeze climbed up through his lungs.

Lincoln frowned but knew he had to let him go for a moment. He scanned the gas station, just a small thing in the middle of nowhere, only one pump to its name. He proceeded to fill up the car with fuel, get some sports drinks, water, some food and a bottle of ibuprofen in the span of seven minutes. He knew Michael would want to hit the road, continue on, but Lincoln's next move was finding a place to stop.

Two minutes later, he drove into the parking lot of a little motel. There was only one room left of the twelve and Lincoln made sure he got it.

Unloading Michael was a hassle all on it's own, but he managed. He even got Michael to the toilet just in time to heave his bile into the clean porcelain bowl. As he lugged their few belongings into the room, it gave his brother the opportunity to have those moments of privacy.

When Lincoln found him slouched against the bowl, he did worry, but then Michael let out a groan and started puking again. When he was done, Lincoln helped him drink some cold water and swallow some pills.

The older of the two started the shower, turning it to a lukewarm temperature before peeling away Michael's sweat-soaked clothes and helping him in. Michael clenched his eyes shut as his body shook with chills. He shuttered with every movement, and once he started to gravitate to the floor out of weakness, Lincoln pulled his own clothes off and got in with him. He held his brother with strong arms as he used the little complimentary shampoo and body wash to clean away the dirt and grime left on his weary body. Whatever was left, he used on himself and soon had them both spotless and dried off, if not a little more exhausted for the process

He was really starting to get concerned when Michael didn't even bat an eyelid when he helped him into some fresh clothes. An intimate procedure that, though he treated clinically, was still something that he wished could happen under better circumstances.

The chills had died down some which Lincoln took as a good thing, but Michael hadn't really talked at all the last few hours. Michael was always thinking of something, prepping for something, finding a way around something, and to see him so listless—so weak—was a legitimate cause for alarm in Linc's mind.

He was missing the determined glint perpetually ingrained in his little brother's bright eyes. He felt alone and responsible in a way that he probably shouldn't; he wasn't stupid, but he also wasn't the brains in their operation.

Michael stirred and mumbled something as Lincoln lifted the blankets over him.

"Can't hear you." Lincoln mumbled and sat down on the edge of the bed, leaning forward to listen more clearly.

"Said we—we gotta keep going." Michael choked out.

"Not with you like this. If you're better in the morning, we'll talk." Lincoln rose up from the bed but was stopped by a weak hand wrapping around his wrist.

"Don't go." Michael winced, as if the two words had ripped his throat raw.

Lincoln raised an eyebrow. "I'm just going to the couch." 

When Michael's eyes fluttered open, the surface glazed over from the fever and a couple of unshed tears, he sent Lincoln a pleading look. He gave Linc's hand a light tug and mumbled with his last bit of unspent energy: "Stay."

"Do you mean you want me to—?" Lincoln began, eyeing the empty side of the queen bed.

Michael nodded wearily, still looking up at his brother with those deep, innocent ocean eyes.

Lincoln nodded slowly, checking the locks on the door again before shutting off the dim light and crawling under the covers with Michael.

Michael immediately gravitated toward Lincoln, burying his head against his brother's bare chest and tangling their bodies together. "Don't feel so good."

"Gonna puke again?" Lincoln asked softly, gently stroking Michael's hair.

Michael shook his head, "No. So tired. Head. _Pounding_." 

"The medicine should kick in soon okay? I'll wake you later to take some more."

"Don't go." Michael muttered once more before he finally slipped into a light sleep, fuelled by Lincoln's steady breathing beneath him and the hand that so carefully carded through his hair.

 

In the morning, Michael, still feeling like shit but at least a little more coherently so, insisted that they continue on. Lincoln was hesitant about it, but he agreed to it as long as Michael wasn't anywhere near the driver's seat. Michael had no qualms about being the passenger, especially since it meant he could lay his head in Lincoln's lap again. He could relax for a short time while someone else called the shots, and as against his nature as that was, it was certainly a breath of fresh air.

Over the next couple of weeks, a lot of things changed, but there were some constants throughout their blurred road to freedom. Among those constants, a few stuck out to Lincoln.

Even as Michael returned to a fully coherent state of mind, as his fever receded and his body healed, Lincoln noticed that anytime he slept in the truck, it was on his lap. Anytime they stopped for the night, Michael would pull him into bed and they'd lie together on a mattress too small for two men. And anytime Michael's mind was too full, when it was late at night and he could practically _hear_ the guy thinking, all it took was running a hand through his hair to put him right to sleep.

He noticed all of these things and when Michael said goodnight with a kiss after a particularly gruelling day, it all made sense. It made sense and _fuck_ , he hadn't realized how much he'd wanted that very same thing until that very second.

"Sorry." Michael was immediately panicking, mind going into overdrive. But Lincoln wasn't having it. No, he was wrapping Michael up in his arms and kissing him right back. He was snatching at the end of the rope, the tinted vulnerabilities that Michael almost never left on display.

"Don't be sorry," Lincoln murmured, "Never be sorry for anything like that."

"Linc." Michael groaned against the other man's lips, "You sure this is what you want?"

"I want you." Lincoln nodded, pulling away from Michael's lips as he pressed their foreheads together, "It's always been you." He whispered quietly. The whir of the shitty air conditioning unit kicking in on the other side of the room startled them both, but they settled back into each other with ease.

"Where do we go from here?" Michael asked aloud, already trying to figure out every possible outcome of what this was now, what this latest development could mean.

Lincoln smiled at him then, unable to stop himself as he pulled Michael in tightly, pressing a chaste kiss into the hair on the top of his head. "Exactly where we were going before."


End file.
